Google Rewarding Adsense Publishers
November 27th, 2006
It’s that time of year again and Google is sending out gifts to the top Adsense publishers over the globe. This year it is reported people have been receiving digital photo frames.
For those of you who haven’t seen this gadgets yet, they’re pretty neat! Worth around £50 they’re essentially a mini screen made to look like a photo frame which you plug in your digital camera card to and wham, you have your digital photos on display on your favorite mantlepiece!
Google have been sending out digital photo frames with 3.6″ LCD, which can handle JPGs, audio (mp3/wma/wav) and video (asf). They run off battery, USB or standard power outlet.
Shame however, if you’re a top Adsense publisher - you’ve probably already got one! How about something for the up and coming ones? 
zoomzoom Fund Raising For Charity
November 20th, 2006
zoomzoom will be starting a web-based initiative in the new year, dedicated to raising money for worthy UK charities. The scheme is absolutely free for charities to join and will be launched nationally. If you’re part of a charity or know one who can use some extra cash (which don’t?!) then drop us a line.
The effect of bad outgoing links
November 20th, 2006
A Google official has recently commented on bad neighborhood links and how they affect your web site rankings on Google.
It seems that Google doesn’t like the following types of web sites:
- free for all links pages (FFA) - link farms (automated linking schemes with lots of unrelated links) - known web spammers In a discussion in a webmaster forum, Google’s Adam Lasnik has recently clarified what Google looks for in regards to bad neighborhood penalties:
1. There is no relation between outbound links and Google’s supplemental index.
“It’s unlikely that your outbound linking is causing your pages to be listed in the supplemental, rather than main index.”
2. Google looks for bad neighborhood linking patterns
“Also, be assured that we’re not looking to penalize folks for a ‘bad’ link here and there. Rather, our algorithms are tuned to look for patterns of ‘egregious’ linking behavior… both on individual sites and in the aggregate.”
3. You should check the links on your web site
“It’s certainly in your users’ interest that you regularly audit outgoing links on your site (especially prominent ones) to ensure that you’re not losing folks’ trust by sending them to inappropriate places or 404 pages. Sure, it’s great to keep Google happy, but it’s usually more important (long term) to have your users be return visitors.”
Also many links to 404 error pages might cause ranking problems. For that reason, it’s a good idea to check the links on your web site every now and then. So always check your pages are linking to relevant, working sites, and if they arent, use robots.txt or meta tags to stop Google following those links.
The Elephant And The Blind Marketers
November 9th, 2006
I stumbled across the old story of the elephant and the blind men today. For those of you who don’t know it:
A group of blind men touch an elephant to learn what it is like. Each one touches a different part, but only one part, such as the side or the tusk. They then compare notes on what they felt, and learn they are in complete disagreement. The story is used to indicate that reality may be viewed differently depending upon one’s perspective. They conclude that the elephant is like a wall, snake, spear, tree, fan, or rope, depending upon where they touch.
A parallel perhaps to the vantage point you view your own company from. What do you think your customers want from your brand?
When was the last time you asked them directly? You have asked them, haven’t you?
Search with a guide
November 9th, 2006
Yesterday, a friend introduced me to chacha.com - a search engine. The difference with ChaCha.com is that you have have two options; search without a guide, search with a guide. Entering a search term and clicking “with guide” will load up your search results, with a live chat window on the left. The chat window will put you through to an assistance who will provide you help sourcing the information you are after.
I experienced a few problems, on my first search “Why is ChaCha better than Google?” I got my search results, but the assistance window was closed due to “restricted content”, my second search “no assistant could be located”. So, you failed my 30 second test ChaCha. The search results take a long time to open, however it has interesting potential.
